Privacy Policy

THIS PRIVACY POLICY WAS LAST UPDATED ON 7 August 2013.

Guinness World Records Limited ((“us” or “we” or “our”) respect the privacy rights of our online visitors to www.guinnessworldrecords.com and related sub-domains including challengers.guinnessworldrecords.com (the “Site”) and are committed to providing and maintaining a safe and secure online environment. This Privacy Policy (the "Privacy Policy") explains Guinness World Records' online information practices and describes how Guinness World Records collects, uses and shares any of the following information obtained from and about our online visitors (i) personally identifiable information ("PII") such as, your first and last name, address, telephone number, screen name, email address or credit card information and (ii) other information which does not allow us to personally identify you ("Non-PII") such as, your first name, the first half of your post code, city, age, gender, product and promotional preferences and household characteristics like presence of children or income bracket information.

PARENTS

We encourage parents/guardians to become involved in their children's online experience. Please discuss use of the Internet and disclosure of information on our Site or any web site with your children. Additionally, parents please discuss this Privacy Policy with your children so they better understand how to use our Site and the kinds of information we may ask of them.

USERS UNDER 13 YEARS OF AGE

Guinness World Records is fully committed to supporting and complying with the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act 1998. Children can use our Site, view content, and download materials without Guinness World Records collecting PII.

Certain areas of the Site from time to time (for example games, prize draws) may request information from the user. Where the user is under 13, the child will be prompted to provide contact details for their parent or legal guardian and will also be prompted to ask their parent or legal guardian to consent to the provision of personal information by the child. The personal information requested will be kept to a minimum but of course you have to consent on behalf of your child in all cases. Where you do not wish your child to provide personal information, please do not provide your consent.

The only case where we do not require your consent to the provision of information is where we are offering a competition where the only purpose of collecting a child’s email address will be for the purpose of notifying them that they are a winner of the competition. Where we wish to provide the opportunity to sign up to receive promotional materials following the competition, we will request your consent.

WHEN PII AND NON-PII MAY BE REQUESTED

ADULTS

Registration or input of PII may be requested for participation in activities such as registrations, sweepstakes, contests, marketing and promotional activities, surveys, email newsletters, e-commerce or sending questions/comments to us. We will not require anyone to disclose more PII than we deem reasonably necessary to participate in the activity, fulfil your request or achieve our legitimate business objectives. However, if PII is requested for participation in an activity, you cannot participate without disclosing such PII.

UNDER-13s

With under-13s our collection if PII is limited to the below areas and except in very limited circumstances (one-off competitions), parental consent to the collection of PII will always be sought. We will also never collect more information than is necessary to enable participation in a service or activity offered on the Site.

Submitting a record attempt claim to Guinness World Records - Children are always keen to set new records and to try to break existing ones. A child can submit a claim for a record attempt to us by contacting us by email with details of the attempt. However as part of this process, they will be asked to obtain the consent of a parent or guardian to their making an application. Where consent is provided, PII collected as part of this process will be used in accordance with the terms of separate agreement that we require an applicant to enter into.

Email updates - A child can sign up to receive updates from us. For this they will need to provide their email address. Where the Site provides an opportunity to sign up, the user will be asked for their date of birth. Where they are under 13, the user will then be asked for the email address of a parent or guardian, and will also be asked to talk to their parent about the mailing list they wish to sign up to. A parent will then be asked to provide their consent to their child signing up. At any time, the parent/child can ask to unsubscribe their child, and in relation to your email address, we only store this for the purposes of contacting you about your child’s wish to sign up for updates.

Competitions - We provide competitions on the Site from time to time. The terms of each competition will govern whether or not under-13s may enter. Where an under-13 may enter the competition, we will ask for an email address. We will also require an email address of the child's parent or legal guardian to be provided as well. A child's email address will only be collected by GWR to administer the competition and will be immediately deleted after conclusion of the competition and once the winning name has been chosen.

The winner (and their parent or legal guardian where their email address has been obtained) will be notified in accordance with the terms of the competition and we may require further information from the parent or guardian including an address where to send any prize from the competition. The winner's email address or postal address and the winner's parent or legal guardian's email address or postal address will then be deleted. If you win a competition we shall publish your name (but not your e-mail or postal address) on our site.

As mentioned above, as part of entry to the competition an under-13 may be given the opportunity to sign-up to receive updates from us. If this is the case, parent consent will be sought in the same manner as at the ‘Email updates’ section.

Quizzes - From time to time we may feature quizzes on our website for a child to compete in and we may publish the child's scores on our global quiz scoreboard together with your name and the country you live in.

Postcards: Our Site may provide children the opportunity to send electronic postcards to family or friends. To send electronic postcards, we may ask for a first name, but we do not require under-13s to submit PII about themselves in order to send an electronic postcard. However, we do ask them to submit the email address of the recipient of such electronic postcards.

All information collected from electronic postcards is used only to send the requested electronic postcard and is deleted once the electronic postcard is sent. We may also collect an email address and name from a child for the sole purpose of responding directly to a specific online request from the child. As soon as the response is sent to the child, all information collected from such request will be deleted.

If at any time a parent/guardian wishes to withdraw their consent to any of the above areas, they can contact us using the information listed below and any information about their child will be deleted from the applicable area(s).

Except for the circumstances outlined above, we will not knowingly ask for, or accept, PII from persons under the age of 13. In relation to other opportunities on the Site to provide PII, before accepting PII from anyone, we ask the user for their date of birth.

If from the information provided, the user is under 13, we will not knowingly accept that person's PII and that person will be restricted from participating in such web page activities at that time.

If we have knowledge that a child under 13 has provided us with PII, we will delete such information from our records. If you become aware for any reason that your child has provided PII to us outside of the above mentioned exceptions, please contact us and we will arrange for any PII we hold to be deleted. You may also contact us at any time to enquire as to whether we hold any PII in relation to your child.

USE OF PII – UNDER-13s

We will only use the PII collected for the purposes outlined above.

USE OF PII – ADULTS AND OVER-13s

We may use your PII in activities such as the ones indicated above. We may also use your PII for the following purposes: (i) to personalise and enhance our Site and your Internet experience, (ii) for internal marketing and demographic studies, (iii) to contact you for non-marketing purposes (such as for feedback or customer service), (iv) to comply with applicable laws or requests by law enforcement agencies and (v) to protect the rights, property or safety of our Site, users of our Site and others.

The PII you disclose may be shared with third parties that provide support of our Site's activities, such as those who may administer an activity for us, those conducting online contests and sweepstakes and shipping companies or fulfilment houses that may deliver a product, prize or premium. These third parties will use your PII to perform their functions and may not use it for other purposes.

Guinness World Records does not sell or otherwise disclose PII to third parties, except as indicated in this section. In the event of a merger, acquisition, reorganisation or other similar event, your PII may be transferred or shared with our successors or assigns. We may also share PII collected from one of our Site with any other of our Site and with other Guinness World Records companies.

OPTING-OUT

If you wish to receive emails about Guinness World Records and trusted partners, including special offers, products and other information you might find interesting, you may opt-in to receive such information at the time of registration or at the time of collection of PII.

If you are receiving such emails from Guinness World Records and wish to opt-out of receiving them, you can do so by (i) clicking on the designated unsubscribe link within the Guinness World Records email, (ii) choosing Contact Us from the appropriate section on the Site and entering "Remove," along with the applicable email address, in the Comments box, or (iii) writing us at:

E-COMMERCE

Purchases through our Site may require disclosure of your PII, your credit card information and information about the name and address of the person receiving the purchases. The credit card information may be subject to verification by the issuing credit card company or other company. Sales and shipping records will also be generated and maintained.

Unless you give us permission at the time we collect such information, we will not use this information for any purpose except the fulfilment and record keeping of the transaction.

THIRD PARTY ADVERTISEMENTS

We may include on our Site’s banner or text advertisements from third parties, or for web sites operated by third parties, that are not sponsors of and are not affiliated with our Site. As such, we are not responsible for the content, polices or practices of the web sites operated by these third parties. In addition, these advertisements and/or links do not constitute sponsorship, endorsement or approval by us of the content, policies or practices of these web sites.

These third parties may use information (not including your name, address, email address or telephone number) about your visits to this Site and other web sites in order to provide advertisements about goods and services of interest to you. If you would like more information about this practice and to know your choices about not having this information used by these companies, please see details in our Cookie Policy.

In relation to children’s use of the Site, we do not permit interest-based advertising on elements of the Site specifically directed to children under 13 or where we have actual knowledge that a child is under 13.

USAGE OF COOKIES AND OTHER TRACKING DEVICES

In providing the above third party advertisements and providing the Site generally, GWR will make use of cookies. For more information on cookies, please see our Cookie Policy.

TRANSFER OF PERSONAL DATA

As Guinness World Records operates globally, it may be necessary to transfer your information internationally, and in particular, your information may be transferred to and processed in the United States or the United Kingdom. For residents of the European Union: the data protection and other laws of other countries outside of the European Union may not be as comprehensive as those of the European Union; please be assured that we take all reasonable steps to ensure that your privacy is protected.

SAFETY AND SECURITY

We have implemented various technical and organisational measures to secure and protect the information provided by you. However, no data transmission over the Internet can be guaranteed to be totally secure. While we try to protect your personal information, we cannot guarantee the security of any information you transmit to us. You use the Site, and provide us with personal information, at your own risk. To the extent reasonably necessary to protect a user's safety, we may collect his or her name, address, and/or email address. To protect our security, to protect us against liability, or as required by law, we may collect a user's name and email address. PII collected pursuant to this provision will not be used for any other purpose.

CO-BRANDED MICRO SITES

Web pages and/or micro web sites may be included within our Site and may be co-branded with third party names, logos and/or properties and are operated and maintained by us. While such third parties are sponsors of these web pages or micro web sites, they do not share in any PII collected within those web pages or micro web sites.

REVIEWING, UPDATING AND DELETING PERSONAL INFORMATION

All users may review their PII or the PII of their child at any time. If you would like to review, modify, delete this information or enquire as to whether we hold any PII in relation to you, please write to us with your detailed request at or use our contact form:

AGREEMENT TO THIS PRIVACY POLICY AND PRIVACY POLICY MODIFICATIONS

By using our Site, you are agreeing to this Privacy Policy. If you do not agree with this Privacy Policy, or any of its terms, please do not use this Site or any other Guinness World Records Web Site. From time to time, and at any time, this Privacy Policy may be revised or changed. We will notify you of a material change by placing a notice on our Site or by sending a notice to the primary email address you have specified. All users of our Site should review this Privacy Policy periodically to be up to date on our most current privacy policies and practices.

This Privacy Policy only applies to information Guinness World Records collects online and not information collected offline. Additionally, this Privacy Policy only applies to the Site and not to third party web sites to which we link.